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August 11, 2015

Review: Abelour A'Bunadh - Batting a Thousand

Batting a Thousand

We get asked pretty frequently to recommend a whiskey. Sometimes this is at a dive bar. Do you think people take Robert Parker to Chili's and ask him to recommend a bottle of wine? You know what, they probably do. Anyway, even at a decent liquor store, recommending whiskey is hard.

You have to know things about the person. Intimate things. Do they know whiskey or are they just getting started? Do they like spice? Sweet tooth? Do they like to be tied up and spanked by a smoky monster? (Yes!!)

Do we go for one of our favorites (like a big cask strength Willett or Smooth Ambler)? Or is that going to be too much for the poor soul who just wanted a tasty approachable dram? Do we try to pick something universally accessible (Talisker or Glenmorangie)? Or do we throw in the towel and pick something we don't even really like, but we think they'll like (Macallan)?

We've tried and failed all these approaches, but there's one recommendation that seems to be batting a thousand: Aberlour (pronounce it like there's an "hour" at the end) A'Bunadh (a-boo-nah).

There are so many great things about this bottle. It's off the beaten path. This is something most people will not have heard of, which makes it a great gift. It's a whiskey drinkers whiskey - you'll see this on the bar of many hardcore malt enthusiasts as a staple pour. It's cask strength, around 60%, so it will hit the mark for serious whiskey aficionados who have a taste for the strong stuff. But it's also incredibly smooth and complex, so add a few drops of water and it won't overwhelm a more novice drinker. It's 100% first fill sherry cask, so it masks the high proof with an incredible richness and complexity of flavor. It's not chill-filtered and it's uncolored (more brownie points for malt-heads), giving it a natural creaminess and rich mouthfeel. And finally it's around $70, which makes it a nice generous gift, but not over the top crazy. We've recommended a ton of these bottles, and never gotten a single complaint. Like we said - batting a thousand!

Tasting Notes

Nose: Very unique. This is one you could easily pick out blind because of its distinctive combination of fruits, nuts, and wood. It's very sweet (but not cloying) with honey, oak, and stone fruits (plums, raisins, & apricots) playing equal roles. The sherry is very well integrated and adds richness while diminishing the strong alcohol presence.

Palate: A lot of citrus comes out on the tongue. Sweet tangerines, more honey, It's a good thick mouthfeel, with lots of warmth and richness. More oak though never bitter, lemon cakes and walnuts and chocolate covered cherries.

Finish: This is one of the best and strongest finishes in a non-peated malt that we can remember. There's little burn (none with a splash of water), but a relatively long finish of sweet fruit and charred oak. It's a nice chest-warming sensation that leaves you very satisfied.

So, yeah, we like it.

Get yourself a bottle of A'bunadh, a bottle of Talisker 10, and a bottle of Lagavulin 16 and you'll have yourself a malt section that any whisky fan will nod at with respect. Give one of these bad boys as a gift and you'll likely have a friend for life!

Personally, I alternate between single malt scotch and rye whiskies. Although, admittedly, I'll go to a scotch several times before changing it up with a rye. My favorite rye is surprisingly quite inexpensive: George Dickel rye out of Tullahoma, Tennessee. It is an MGP rye, but they put it through additional steps at the Tennessee facility where it is chilled and charcoal-filtered in sugar maple. That makes it much more smooth than say a Bulleit.

Which batch number is this? The consensus is they vary quite a bit. The last one I tried was more like cider vinegar than what you tasted. A local store gives it away for $47 so I might have to give it another go!

I think it was batch 40, but I could be wrong. It was well over a year ago. I was drinking Mac Cask at the time and just remember thinking how put off I was by the Abunadh in favor of the Mac. Personal preference aside, it might have just been a bad bottle cause I think it was one of the few bottles that went down the sink rather than my endless whiskey hole in my face. :)

That (stock?) photo is very odd. Batch #30 had a different label (with 59.8% abv not 59.6%) and the packaging was a dark box not a tube. IIRC, the packaging was changed for batch #32.Check out the progression of batches in this link: http://www.ramsey.uk.net/whiskies/aberlour.html

Guilty as charged, we used a stock photo out of pure laziness. Ok alright alright I'll try and dig up the photo of our bottle. Pretty sure we took one. It's been sitting in the decanter for a while... Sheesh :)